Faith-Based Resources

Resources

Interfaith Power & Light affiliates from around the country respond to threat of increased pollution

In response to the anticipated Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) move to weaken national clean car standards, a network of Interfaith Power & Light religious communities from states across the nation have issued the following statement:

“As faith-based organizations that are deeply concerned about the health of our communities and God’s Creation, we condemn the decision by EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt to weaken the nation’s vehicle emissions standards.

On Wednesday, June 8, Vermont Interfaith Power and Light's Coordinator Betsy Hardy hosted a kickoff for the Zero Energy Now program sponsored by Green Mountain Power. Betsy's home was lifted up as a model for homes that can be renovated to reduce energy consumption and reliance on nonrenewable sources of energy. Local television coverage can be seen at WPTZ Reports on ZEN Kickoff

As the climate negotiations started in Paris, Vermont activists had a press conference in Montpelier and delivered over 25,000 postcards and petitions in support of a carbon pollution tax to Vermont legislators. VTIPL's Secretary, Rev. Dick Hibbert, was one of the speakers at this Montpelier event. Photos of the event can be seen at Energy Independent Vermont Event.

Betsy Hardy, Coordinator of Vermont Interfaith Power and Light, speaking with Deb Reger on her podcast Moccasin Tracks, talking about the work of our organization, issues with which we are involved, and her own personal experience in responding to the Climate Crisis. The conversation, which aired on UVM's WRUV radio station, can be heard at Betsy Hardy on Moccasin Tracks

This "My Turn" editorial by VTIPL Board Member and Secretray Rev. Richard Hibbert appeared in the Burlington Free Press on August 24, 2014 and in the Rutland Herald and Times Argus (Montpelier) newspapers on September 7, 2014.

VTIPL's Secretary, Rev. Richard Hibbert, represented us at the November 30, 2015 event where Energy Independent Vermont presented petitions and postcards from Vermonters urging the state legislature to enact a Carbon Pollution tax. This article is Zach Tomanelli's article about that event

[Joseph Gainza was a leader for the Faith Leaders as Climate Leaders workshop at our 2015 Fall conference. He has given us permission to share this commentary on our site. A PDF file is also attached.]

Two weeks ago, 100 rail cars carrying crude oil derailed in southern West Virginia, igniting at least 14 tankers, sparking a house fire and spilling oil into the Kanawha River. We remember the 2013 oil train accident in Quebec that killed 47 people and spilled 1.5 million gallons of crude, and the Enbridge pipeline rupture in 2010 that spilled over a million gallons of crude into the Kalamazoo River. And, of course, there was the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico in April 2010.

In his State of the Union speech last week, President Obama said, “But the debate is settled. Climate change is a fact. And when our children's children look us in the eye and ask if we did all we could to leave them a safer, more stable world, with new sources of energy, I want us to be able to say yes, we did.”